Saturday, July 9, 2011

Warhol, Warhol on the wall ... is the federal court the fairest of all?

The University of Texas has sued Ryan O'Neal over his possession of a pricey Warhol portrait of Farrah Fawcett that they claim is theirs per Fawcett's living trust. The only two of these portraits in existence hung in Farrah's Westwood home in her final years. O'Neal was omitted from her "last will and testament".

A lawsuit filed by the UT System Board of Regents on behalf of the university in U.S. District Court in Los Angeles contends that Fawcett bequeathed both portraits to the university but that actor Ryan O'Neal "has wrongfully converted" one of them — legal language for the civil equivalent of stealing.

The university wants a jury to order him to turn it over.

O'Neal's publicist has said that the portrait was given to O'Neal by Fawcett and that he owes nothing to the university. O'Neal and Fawcett were longtime companions; they had a child together, and O'Neal was at Fawcett's side when she died of cancer in 2009 at the age of 62.

UT's suit says Fawcett's trust specified that "all of (her) artwork and any objects of art" would go to the university upon her death. O'Neal may have "converted" other works of art from her collection, according to the suit.